Steve Woda's blog

Poor customer service goes viral

It should be obvious in a day and age with the Internet, YouTube, HD and video cameras, that poor customer service can be very costly to a company.  However, some of the old dinosaurs are a bit slow on the take.  This entertaining music video, "United Breaks Guitars", was produced by a country singer who had a terrible experience on United Airlines.

As I watched the video, I couldn't help but do a bit of math on the implications of such a viral production.  At the time of this blog post, more than 2.5 million people had viewed this music video on YouTube, and the bottom-line is that these 2.5 million people invested more than 11 million total minutes watching a negative message about United Airlines.  That is the same as 22 million 30 second commercials.  That is some serious negative PR!

I enjoyed the song and the video, and I can honestly say I will have a hard time getting the tune (and the message) out of my mind next time I have to consider United Airlines for a flight.  I am sure that at least half of the people that watched the viral video will have the same image stuck in their heads when they have to make a choice between United and other airlines.

Companies clearly have to get serious about treating their customers like gold, and this needs to start at the top of the organization and filter down to each and every employee.  In the video, Ms. Irlweg, a normal United employee, is singled out as the person that made the final decision on whether to solve this customer's problem.  Today, she is infamous because of this video, and her decision turns out to have been pretty costly for United Airlines.

I recently purchased an Apple computer, and after a month or two, I had a tech problem.  I brought it into the Apple Store, and within 10 minutes, I walked out with a brand new laptop (with my old hard drive swapped into it).  The problem Apple fixed, for free and in minutes with a brand new laptop, was the type of problem that would have taken me a week to get fixed with Dell.  I was floored!  I could not believe the awesome customer experience from Apple, and at that moment, I officially converted to an Apple fan.  I have literally told everyone about the experience since that amazing customer service experience.

Although it was initially expensive for Apple to solve my customer service problem, I am 100% sure that their investment in me will pay off many times over in the coming months and years because of the positive word of mouth it created.

I am betting that this singer's negative video on United Airlines will ultimately cost the company hundreds of times what it would have cost to simply solve this customer's problem.  Can you imagine if United had solved this singer's problem quickly, without hassle, and with a smile?  What if they had surprised or shocked him with their amazing customer service?  Perhaps he would have written a different song. "United Loves Guitars" has a much better ring to it.

What is the Most Cost Effective Marketing Channel for eCommerce Merchants? Email Marketing!

According to eMarketer, email marketing is still a very effective means of driving e-commerce.  The following is an excerpt from eMarketer's article, "E-Mail Marketing Still Works"...

First, the good news: permission-based e-mail is great at getting consumers to buy.

Half of US adult e-mail users surveyed in April 2008 for Merkle's "View from the Inbox" study, conducted with Harris Interactive, said they had made an online purchase in the previous year as a result of permission-based marketing.

In addition, e-mail was second only to customer reviews on Web sites for influencing online purchases, according to DoubleClick Performics' "Green Marketing Study," conducted by Opinion Research Corporation in February 2008. E-mail was roughly equal to search results in terms of influencing online purchases.

SPAM emails are obviously a huge problem, but when consumers expect to receive an email from a merchant, they obviously open those emails and respond in a material manner.  Our experience suggests that email marketing is here to stay and in fact, is going to grow in importance for online merchants because there are few, if any, more cost effective ways to drive a sale than to market to your current and past customers via email.  Having said that, consumers are increasingly likely to stop doing business with a retailer if the retailer uses poor email practices.  Therefore, there is a huge opportunity here for merchants, but if done incorrectly, it can be costly. 

Make sure you understand email best practices.  EmailLabs has produced nice list of email best practices that might be helpful for you.

Once you have acquired your customers via more expensive channels like Paid Search Advertising, eBay, or CSEs, make sure you keep them buying from you on a consistent basis by offering them interesting offers via email.  This really is a no brainer.

Read more of the eMarketer article here >> E-Mail Marketing Still Works - eMarketer

Technorati Tags: Email Marketing,eMarketer

Daily Roundup for 2008-04-16

• Does Your Company Need a Chief Blogger? - Advertising Age
  It's a question marketers are still grappling with years after the first waves of corporate blogging flooded the web. But for better or worse, it seems corporate blogging -- and the title of chief blogger -- is beginning to hit its stride. Companies such as Coca-Cola, Marriott and Kodak all have recently recruited chief bloggers, with or without the actual title, to tell their stories and engage consumers.


• Brands Partner With Consumers Online - eMarketer
  These days, online consumers and companies are collaborating on a range of activities, including R&D, marketing and after-sales support.  Here are a few examples of how brands and consumers are working together online.

Daily Roundup for 2008-04-14

• Is Yahoo Right to Resist Microsoft?
  Yahoo's resistance to a takeover by Microsoft looks foolhardy to some investors and Wall Street analysts. But the push-back may prove effective in the end—at least by forcing the suitor to cough up a few more bucks a share.  Executives from Yahoo (YHOO) on Apr. 7 reiterated the reasons for their opposition. The $31-a-share offer, made public Feb. 1, "substantially undervalues" Yahoo, and its stock component is even less attractive in light of Microsoft's (MSFT) slumping share price. "We have continued to launch new products and to take actions which leverage our scale, technology, people, and platforms as we execute on the strategy we publicly articulated," Yahoo Chief Executive Jerry Yang and Chairman Roy Bostock wrote.


• Yahoo Gets a Deadline
  Microsoft (MSFT) just dropped the bomb on Yahoo (YHOO). Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on Apr. 5 sent a letter giving Yahoo's board three weeks before it initiates a proxy fight, including nomination of a new slate of directors likely to approve the deal.

Daily Roundup for 2008-04-10

• Eyeing Prices as Search Keeps Growing - eMarketer
  Even as some marketers rein in spending to hedge against further economic problems, search engine marketing (SEM) is in great shape—at least for the moment.  Search engine advertisers and agencies surveyed for the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO)-sponsored "2007 State of the Market" survey listed multiple reasons for the SEM spending growth, including advertiser demand, rising keyword and pay-per-click campaign costs, small-to-midsized business SEM use and increased behavioral and demographic targeting.  The study was conducted by Radar Research online using an IntelliSurvey panel.


• Your Former Boss Can Kill Your Job Offer: Vault Job Search Career Information
  Many job seekers are blithely unaware that their former employers all too often say things that can damage or halt their career prospects. Most of this is due to the erroneous belief that it's somehow illegal to ask about things other than title and dates of employment during a reference check.  This is simply not true.  Today's courts have literally invented a whole new body of law called "Employment Law." Bundled in this tangle of law is employment pre-screening, otherwise known as reference checking.

101 Five-Minute Fixes to Improve Your Web Site

At buySAFE, our web site is one of our greatest assets.  It is the main avenue by which we communicate with prospective buyer and merchant customers, partners, the media, and investors.  It is the main tool we have for defining buySAFE for the rest of the world.  It is the vehicle we use for creating action with respect to our unique eCommerce trust and safety and advertising services. 

I spend a fair amount of my time thinking about how to better leverage this asset, and then working with my team to improve upon its utility.

Therefore, when I ran across this article, "101 Five-Minute Fixes to Incrementally Improve Your Web Site" by Inside CRM Editors, I thought you would enjoy it too.  Here are their first 10 web site improvement tips, and if you are interested in learning more, you should definitely click through to read their other 91 tips as well.

1. Tell readers why they should perform a task. If your site is full of passive suggestions, toughen it up. People are trained to follow a request, as long as you give them a good reason to do it. 
2. Make the most highly trafficked pages easier to scan. If your current site consists of large blocks of text, break it up so that it's easier for the average Internet user to read. 
3. Convey a sense of trust. If you're experiencing skepticism, offer social proof like testimonials or risk-mitigating offers like a free trial. 
4. Stress benefits. Ensure that your copy always shows users exactly how your site will benefit them. 
5. Make headlines meaningful. Be sure to change any vague or cutesy headlines to something more up-front and meaningful. 
6. Repeat yourself. Check over your copy to make sure that you're really driving the point home by making it in a number of ways. 
7. Tell visitors what to do. Revise your site to ensure that people know exactly what the next step is. If you want a visitor to click a link, tell them 
8. Keep the reader engaged. Make sure that your current content gives visitors a reason to keep reading throughout the entire piece; otherwise, you need to spice things up a bit. 
9. Stay consistent. Check your copy for consistency, or else your site may be seen as unstable or flighty. 
10. Stay simple. Simplify your message simply to avoid confusing visitors, while at the same time improving conversion rates.

Read the other 91 web site improvement tips at "101 Five-Minute Fixes to Incrementally Improve Your Web Site" - Inside CRM >>>

Technorati Tags: Website Tips,Inside CRM

So You Want to Be a Blogging Star?

I have discovered the hard way that blogging is not an easy endeavor, and this is especially true for folks that have real jobs during the day.  At a minimum, it takes time, dedication, and creativity.  I have often wondered how to others do such a great job with their blogs while still maintaining excellence in their day jobs.  To that point, I thought this article was very interesting, and it included a number of practical tips for all of us aspiring bloggers.  I hope you find this useful as well.

MARK CUBAN, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, has a full plate. Besides his basketball team, the busy billionaire also owns part of a media company, and serves as chairman of the TV channel HDNet. He recently competed for five weeks on “Dancing With the Stars” on ABC. How on earth does he find time to blog?

Yet his site, blogmaverick.com, is one of the top 1,000 Weblogs, according to the search engine Technorati. Thousands read Mr. Cuban’s posts every single day. If he can do it, why can’t you?

Read more of "So You Want to Be a Blogging Star?" - New York Times >>>

 

Technorati Tags: Blogging,Mark Cuban,Blogmaverick.com,Technorati,Ted Dziuba,Uncov.com,Xeni Jardin,BoingBoing.net

Daily Roundup for 2008-03-25

• Region's Venture Capital Rank Slips - washingtonpost.com
  Regions of the West Coast and Midwest moved ahead of Washington as top destinations for venture capital in recent years, as the local venture economy grew more slowly than the national average, a Washington Post analysis shows. In 2001, the year the technology bubble popped, Washington ranked sixth among top destinations for venture capital, after Silicon Valley, New England, the New York metro area, Texas and the Southeast. Last year, it was ranked 10th, overtaken by the Northwest, San Diego, the Midwest and Los Angeles/Orange County.


• Hammering out Wikipedia's financial future, argument by argument - Technology Review
  Scroll the list of the 10 most popular Web sites in the U.S., and you'll encounter the Internet's richest corporate players -- names like Yahoo, Amazon.com, News Corp., Microsoft and Google. Except for No. 7: Wikipedia. And there lies a delicate situation. With 2 million articles in English alone, the Internet encyclopedia ''anyone can edit'' stormed the Web's top ranks through the work of unpaid volunteers and the assistance of donors. But that gives Wikipedia far less financial clout than its Web peers, and doing almost anything to improve that situation invites scrutiny from the same community that proudly generates the content.

Daily Roundup for 2008-03-13

• Direct Marketers Bullish on Online Ads - eMarketer
  US direct marketers may reduce their media budgets this year, judging by Target Marketing's "Media Usage Forecast" report. Nearly one-quarter of respondents surveyed in January 2008 said they would reduce their media budgets compared with last year. The n


• Yahoo activates smart mobile bookmarks - Reuters
  Yahoo Inc, still fending off a $41 billion takeover bid by Microsoft Corp, unveiled a cell phone tool on Tuesday that lets users keep up with their favorite topics using dynamic bookmarks. OnePlace, to be launched in the second quarter, allows users to ma

Daily Roundup for 2008-03-08

• Jeremy Siegel on Politicians, Prices and a Potential 'Buying Opportunity of the Decade' - Knowledge@Wharton
  The U.S. Presidential race has reached a critical juncture. The Republicans have a confirmed nominee in John McCain; as for the Democrats, Hillary Clinton has bounced back, while Barack Obama retains a marginal lead in terms of delegates. How the presidential race evolves will be shaped in part by the increasingly worrisome state of the U.S. economy. Consumer prices are rising, oil has crossed $103 a barrel and gold is nudging $1,000 an ounce -- suggesting that the economy could be entering a phase of 1970s-style stagflation. Fed chairman Ben Bernanke, however, told Congress last week that he doesn't anticipate stagflation, and he continues to indicate his willingness to keep cutting interest rates. What lies ahead for the U.S. and world economies? Knowledge@Wharton discussed these questions and more with finance professor Jeremy Siegel, author of The Future for Investors.


• Ecommerce Blogging: Who, What And When: Well-written blogs create credibility, interest
  Last month I talked about blogging platforms and the value blogging can bring to ecommerce sites. When a website makes the decision to begin a blog and decides upon a blogging platform, it will then have to decide who will blog and how often. Time allotted to blogging is also a relative issue, as is subject matter. So why bother at all?  Relative to static ecommerce sites, search engines consider blogs more real and trusted because blogs tend to have fresh content and there is a less financial, more informational link between a blog and its readers. An ecommerce site should take advantage of this tendency by adding a blog to augment the overall site.

Daily Roundup for 2008-03-07

• Sites With Anti-Fraud Sign Still Flawed - The Associated Press
  When a small padlock appears in the corner of your Web browser's address bar or the entire bar turns green, it seems like a powerful signal you're safe to proceed.  But experts say the SSL certificates those green lights signify — digital stamps of approval that Web sites buy to prove they're running a legitimate business and can send and receive encrypted data safely — don't provide the safety they seem to.  "They instill some sense of security, but that could be a dangerously false sense of security," said Paul Mutton, a researcher with UK-based security firm Netcraft Ltd.  The site itself could still be riddled with security holes for hackers to exploit. And the certificate could simply be bogus: Criminals have been forging them to get the padlock icon and dress up fraudulent sites.


• Web 2.0's Long Road to IPOs
  During the Web's heyday, a profitable Internet company nearing $100 million in annual sales while luring a million new customers a month would have found itself on the IPO fast track. But that's hardly the case for LinkedIn, a professional networking site that has cleared those hurdles and then some.  Instead, LinkedIn is hewing closely to the Web economy's new motto on initial public offerings: Easy does it. Founded in 2003, LinkedIn may not sell shares until some time next year. Likewise, social networking site Facebook, worth $15 billion on paper, may not go public until 2010,

Daily Roundup for 2008-03-06

• The Tipping Point—Web Logo Style
  The other day, a friend who runs a small business lamented that his Web site wasn't worth the trickle of business it brought in. Something told me he's not alone. In fact, some estimates have found the majority of small-business Web sites fail to generate revenue.  Which is too bad, because I think that entrepreneurs like my friend make a mistake by blaming the site itself, or even the medium of the Web. The problem, in my view, is not the site—it's the lack of trust in the company behind the site. Trust is an elusive concept, of course; the sort of term bandied about freely in Marketing 101 but rarely defined adequately since any of us found ourselves in that class. Building trust is important. Building trust via your Web site is essential. Now here comes the biggie: How?


• A VC: Thoughts On Choosing Board Members
  I am a professional board member. I've been sitting on boards for almost 20 years and I've seen a lot. I've seen some of the best board members in action and have tried to copy them. I've seen some of the worst board members in action and have tried hard to forget them.  Here are some thoughts on choosing board members. This advice is for everyone, but it's of particular use when you are a bigger company, maybe public, and need to fill your board with good people.

Daily Roundup for 2008-03-02

• The Psychology Of Buying - Behavioral Insider
  The recently launched 7 Billion People is an intriguing application to e-commerce of the real-world psychology behind buying behaviors. As CEO Mark Nagaitis tells us, his new Web analytics system tries to discern in a site's audience different "buying personalities" that marketers can talk with in very different ways.


• InternetNews Realtime IT News – Americans' e-Commerce Conundrum
  A new study from the Pew Internet Project casts light on the love-hate relationship many Americans have with e-commerce. In response to the survey, 78 percent of U.S. Internet users said that online shopping is convenient, and 68 percent said it saves time. Yet, 75 percent said they don't like giving out personal information like a credit card number over the Internet.  The security risks, real or perceived, are hampering the growth of the Internet economy, said John Horrigan, associate director of the Pew Internet Project and author of the report.

Google is an advertising cheapskate!

What is the most valuable brand in the world?  Google is the number one brand in the world with an estimated value of $66 billion according consulting firm Millward Brown Optimor. 
This got me thinking... How did Google become the most valuable brand in the world in just a short nine years?  As the Founder of a consumer-focused internet company, I find this question very interesting.  Conventional wisdom would suggest that Google must spend billions of dollars in advertising every year to accomplish such an impressive feat.

Well after a bit of research, one thing becomes clear... Google is an advertising cheapskate!

Build Buyer Trust to Drive Holiday Revenue

How can you drive up your holiday revenue?  Build trust with your buyers!  That's right.  By simply spending a bit of time and energy thinking about how your consumers do their searching, shopping, and decision-making, you can increase your holiday revenues in a material fashion.

On Wednesday, October 24, 2007 at 11:00-12:00 PM MDT, I will be giving an educational webinar sponsored by Infopia and buySAFE on the subject of building trust with your buyers to drive up your revenues and profits.

If you can spare an hour of your time, I promise you that you will learn something new and interesting.  If you are serious about building your online business, this will be time well spent.

Space is limited, so please register for the webinar as soon as you get a moment.  You can register at https://www.gotomeeting.com/register/890705170.

Related articles:
"Infopia Integrates with buySAFE" - Infopia Blog

Survey Reveals Shoppers Are Nervous

I often hear people suggest that since eCommerce is growing so fast, shoppers are obviously perfectly confident and comfortable shopping online.  In my opinion, that is naive, and it ignores the facts. 

During the recent holiday shopping season, a new survey was published confirming that consumers are, in fact, nervous shopping online, and that these concerns are growing, not abating.  buySAFE commissioned an independent firm, InsightExpress, to survey 1,000 random, online shoppers for their views on trust, safety, security and eCommerce.  The eCommerce survey reveals that small and medium-sized retailers without well-known brand names are the big losers when it comes to nervous shoppers.  More than 1/3 of shoppers, 35%, feel "unsafe" when considering purchasing from unknown retailers.   

WOMMA's Word of Mouth Marketing Summit Will Include More Than 70 WOM Expert Speakers

WOMMA (The Word of Mouth Marketing Association) is holding its next Word of Mouth Marketing Summit in Washington, D.C. on December 12 and 13.  It should be a great event.  There will be more than 70 speakers, several big-name authors, and three incredible keynotes all talking about word of mouth marketing.

If you are interested in word of mouth, viral, buzz, or blog marketing, you should try to make it to this conference.  You can register online at www.womma.org/summit2.

buySAFE Announces New Partnership With Travelers

Today, buySAFE announced a new partnership with The St. Paul Travelers Companies, one of the largest financial institutions in the world with more than $113 billion in assets.

The new Travelers relationship adds another major U.S. financial institution to buySAFE's growing team of business partners.  The Hartford Financial Services Group and The Rutherfoord Companies are major investors in buySAFE, and in 2005, Liberty Mutual Insurance Company joined with buySAFE to provide significant surety bond capacity for buySAFE's rapidly growing business on eBay, Overstock.com, and TIAS.

What's Wrong With eBay? It's Simple Economics

What's wrong with eBay?  Before I answer this question, you should download this Wharton case study by Dr. Eric Clemons of The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.  Dr. Clemons is one of the world's most renowned experts on information economics, and this case study is currently being taught at Wharton this semester.  It goes into great detail discussing eBay's current challenges, and I believe you will find it insightful.

Okay back to the question...  What's wrong with eBay?

e-Fluentials are critical to your marketing success

Check out this terrific post on WOMMA's blog by Andrew Nibley, Chairman and CEO of Marsteller on the subject of how to leverage "e-Fluentials" to market and promote your products.

Andrew is exactly right.  My buySAFE experience has proven to me how important positive e-fluentials are for your business, and this is especially true when launching a new business in a new industry.  e-Fluentials are the folks that will educate the rest of the market on your product.  Just as important is the need to reach out and manage the concerns of negative e-fluentials.  It is obviously common that you won't agree with these folks, but their perspectives provide valuable learning experiences nevertheless.  I also believe these folks, if ultimately converted, will often become your strongest evangelists in the future.  At buySAFE, this has been critical.

Again, check out Andrew's insights here.

Seth Godin on the buySAFE Podcast Network

One of my favorite authors is Seth Godin. Recently, buySAFE was able to catch-up with Seth to get his thoughts on eCommerce, permission marketing, buySAFE, and a couple of other interesting tidbits. The buySAFE podcast was pretty interesting for me, and I hope you enjoy it as well.

Although each of his books is a treat, in my humble opinion, I believe Seth Godin’s best work is Permission Marketing. If you haven’t read it, you should. The concepts he outlines terrific for folks that market online in today’s world.

Technorati: Permission Marketing, buySAFE, Seth Godin, Podcast

Del.icio.us: Permission Marketing, buySAFE, Seth Godin, Podcast

Customer service. Is it a lost art?

I recently met a smart, young marketer by the name of Craig Montgomery.  He has a terrific blog covering the subject of marketing, and he recently did a post that I thought was worth thinking about.

Customer service is something that lots of companies talk about, and very few do well.  In this post, Craig talks about Starbucks and the lost art of customer service.

Honestly, as a busy person, customer service (or the lack thereof) influences almost every repeat purchase decision I make. I suspect I am not alone.